Bound by Prophecy (Bound Series Book 3) Read Online Free Page B

would bind her. I would come back to him and myself.
    A slow trickle of warmth seeped through my system. Similar to a warm meal on a cold night, I felt replenished and comfortable. I stopped a sigh before it left my lips and huddled farther back in the corner where Baleon found me.
    Nothing would look out of the ordinary, but I was preparing for a war.

7
    M y last stop was Cole . I approached his door with a certain mixture of unease and determination. Baleon was still with Amelia. I snuck a look in her window to find him in the same position I’d left him in, except now a bright orange glow took up the space between his hand and her skin. I forced myself to move along and allow him to do what was best for her, satisfied I was doing the same.
    I stood outside Cole’s door, shifting my weight from foot to foot. Bethany offered to come with me, to bridge the gap, so to speak, but I knew she wasn’t what we needed. If Cole needed persuading, it wasn’t going to be with a big smile and some southern catchphrase. It was time to man up and get the job done. The words bounced around inside my head and were just as much for me as they might need to be for him.
    I knocked three sharp raps on the dark-stained wood. The deep thunk was satisfying. He must have expected Bethany, which was exactly as I’d hoped, because he opened the door and then turned away, walking back across the room. I stepped through and let it stay open behind me. I stared at his back. The man I’d trained with, who I had even feared for a brief time before he knew about Amelia and me, looked like a shell of himself.
    All the shades were closed, preventing even a speck of sunlight from entering his room. One small bedside lamp cast a low yellow glow throughout the room, giving me small hints at the mess that accumulated over the past few days. My nose did the rest. I smelled the dirty laundry, his unwashed body, and the food-crusted plates he’d piled on the small desk in the corner. This Cole was nothing like the regimented, controlled man I’d met in the gym.
    “What do you want, Montgomery?” he asked, keeping his back to me.
    “You can’t hide in here forever, Cole. She needs you.” I cut straight to it.
    Cole whirled around and in seconds, had me pinned against the wall by my throat. His hold wasn’t too tight, but the pads of his fingers and his thumb pressed against my windpipe as he eyed me from inches away.
    “ She needs me? She did this! This is her fault! Don’t you get it? He sacrificed himself for her . Mom sacrificed herself for her . They gave me this godforsaken power JUST FOR HER . All these years, I thought I was making up for the fact that I had time with Mom and Dad and she didn’t. Instead, I enabled her to do whatever damn thing she wanted so she could blame the prophecy, or being the one who had to protect us, or the one the Queen was after. I gave up my life and my relationship with my father… and now he’s gone .”
    His emotions were everywhere. His magic spiked and eroded in the most erratic ways. I stood still, barely breathing as I watched his chest heave and heard his voice break. Cole had borne the brunt of Amelia’s fate and she had no idea.
    I wanted to empathize with him. To gently take him from here to where I needed him to be, but there wasn’t time. Cole’s grip on my throat loosened and his hand dropped to his side. He stumbled backwards and dropped onto the bed. I wondered if he’d been drinking, but I couldn’t feel anything impaired about him outside of his spastic magic.
    “Cole,” I started quietly, “I hear what you’re saying, man, and it isn’t fair. What you saw, what you had to do, none of it was right. But, Amelia didn’t choose this. She didn’t ask your parents for this power, or this prophecy. She was a baby and she didn’t have a choice. She needed you. She needs you now. I was able to get to her, to talk to her. I told her about your father and you were the first person she asked